Closet Cosplay: Princess Leia for May the 4th

As I’ve mentioned a number of times here on the blog, I am a massive Star Wars fan. Star Wars was my first love, being the first “real” movies I was allowed to watch when I was a pretty little kid. The first movie I ever saw at the cinema was Episode I: The Phantom Menace (spare your criticisms, I LOVE THAT MOVIE). So when May the 4th comes around, I’m always excited to share my love for the Star Wars universe; and this usually happens in the form of some kind of costume.

Star Wars Day was on a Wednesday this year, which is one of my work days. So obviously I had to dig through my closet to put together something really awesome. That being said, picking a character to portray is always a difficult task, when it comes to cosplay. I am the worst at making those kinds of decisions, and I am always having trouble committing to one specific idea. While Star Wars still has a lot of work to do in regard to diversity, there are three kickass gal characters that I love; Princess Leia Organa of the Original Trilogy, Queen Amidala/Padmé Naberrie of the Prequel Trilogy, and of course, Rey of The Force Awakens. I love these women. I look up to them. And Carrie Fisher has been a continual inspiration to me, throughout my life. She overcame addiction, and continuously battles with bipolar disorder, and is never afraid to talk about her illness or have a sense of humour about it. I think it’s this reason that I decided on Princess Leia.

The next question is: What iconic Leia look do I want to do? This was maybe even more difficult to decide than the initial character choice. In the end, I decided to combine different elements from three of my favourites.

The original costume from A New Hope. Those buns though.

A New Hope award ceremony dress.

Empire Strikes Back Hoth costume.

From Leia’s iconic look from A New Hope, I decided to take her bagel buns. I felt that this way, everyone would be able to tell exactly who I was. From Leia’s second costume in A New Hope, I wanted to add the accent of silver jewelry. This gave the look a little bit of elevation, and made it more appropriate for the office. Finally, I added a vest, as homage to Leia’s Hoth outfit in The Empire Strikes Back. and of course, the whole ensemble had to be white, Leia’s signature colour. I paired my Leia pieces with a pair of jeans, because leggings were not really office appropriate.

Looking at the whole outfit assembled, I really wish I had been able to find/put together a belt. It would have really broken up the look, and made my waistline more visible, which I think is the problem with how I’m seeing it now. The dress/top is SO COMFY. I wish it wasn’t cut so high on the sides so I could wear it more often; I think this is another issue with how the outfit ended up looking. The top doesn’t fit quite as well as it did when I first got it, because you know, bodies change over the course of two or so years. Another alternative would be to add a pair of boots in place of the shoes, for a more specifically “costumed” vibe.

I really REALLY wanted to recreate the makeup from A New Hope. The look is just so bright and fresh, accenting Carrie Fisher’s stunning eyes. My eyelashes unfortunately didn’t do “the thing”, and ended up looking kinda wonky after wearing my glasses all day. I also maybe should have added blush and a highlight, to give my face some more definition. But all in all, I’m really happy with how the look turned out. Leia has this really neat peachy sparkly lip gloss thing going on in A New Hope; the only colour that I had that was kind of close to that tone that still looked good with my skin, was my NARS Rikugien lip pencil. Just the right amount of shine, and colour definition. Unfortunately I’m not always as sharp as I would like to be in the morning before work, so it wasn’t something that was on my radar.

Finally, those buns. I did them fairly simply, by just using two elastics on each side and a handful of bobbypins. I started off with some texturizing dry shampoo (my favourite is Batiste), so that my buns would be more full. After pinning everything in place, I pulled some spots loose to create more volume. Had I thought more carefully about executing my do, I would have gone out to get another bun donut to help with structuring… and getting a more authentic bun shape. But I digress.

I love being creative with my clothes, especially when I can pretend to be a fictional character that I love.